Sandra was born in Chicago December 20,1954. She grew up in Mexico and Chicago. She was the third born of seven children, she was the only girl. Her family had wealth, because her maternal great-grandfather had played the piano for the Mexican president. Her paternal grandfather was a veteran of the Mexican Revolution, and used what money he had saved to give to his son Alfredo Cisneros de Moral, the opportunity to go to college. Unfortunately Alfredo failed out of college, left Mexico and went to the United States. Later on he started his family in Chicago where Sandra was born.
Sandra earned a B.A. in English from Loyola University of Chicago and an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa. She also received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Iowa Writer's Workshop at the University of Iowa in 1978. She attended a workshop and Cisneros discovered how the particular social position she occupied gave her writing a unique potential. She recalls being suddenly struck by the differences between her and her classmates: "It wasn't as if I didn't know who I was. I knew I was a Mexican woman."
Her books of poetry include Loose Woman (Knopf, 1994), My Wicked, Wicked Ways (1987), The Rodrigo Poems (1985), and Bad Boys (1980). She is also the author of Caramelo (2003);Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories(1991), which won the Quality Paperback Book Club New Voices Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, and the Lannan Foundation Literary Award; and of course The House on Mango Street (1984), which won the American Book Award in 1985; and a bilingual children's book, and Many more.
Sandra currently lives in a Mexican-pink painted house with many creatures in San Antoni, Texas.
Old Maids by Sandra Cisneros
My cousins and I, we don't marry. We're too old by Mexican standards.
And the relatives
have long suspected
we can't anymore
in white.
My cousins and I,
we're all old
maids at thirty.
Who won't dress children,
and never saints--
though we undress them.
The aunts,
they've given up on us.
No longer nudge--You're next.
Instead-- What happened in your childhood? What left you all mean teens? Who hurt you, honey?
But we've studied
marriages too long--
Aunt Ariadne, Tia Vashti, Comadre Penelope, querida Malintzin, Senora Pumpkin Shell--
lessons that served us well.
Las Girlfriends
by Sandra Cisneros
Tip the barmaid in tight jeans.
She's my friend.
Been to hell and back again.
I've been there too.
Girlfriend, I believe in Gandhi.
But some nights nothing says it
quite precise like a lone Star
cracked on someone's head.
Last week in this same bar,
kicked a cowboy in the butt
who made a grab for Terry's ass.
How do I explain, it was all
of Texas I was kicking,
and all our asses on the line.
At Tacoland, Cat flamencoing crazy
circles round the pool
player with the furry tongue.
A warpath of sorts for every
wrong ever wronged us.
And Terry here has her own history,
A bar down the street she can't
Sandra Cisneros
Born in Chicago December 20,1954
By: Julianna MartinezSandra was born in Chicago December 20,1954. She grew up in Mexico and Chicago. She was the third born of seven children, she was the only girl. Her family had wealth, because her maternal great-grandfather had played the piano for the Mexican president. Her paternal grandfather was a veteran of the Mexican Revolution, and used what money he had saved to give to his son Alfredo Cisneros de Moral, the opportunity to go to college. Unfortunately Alfredo failed out of college, left Mexico and went to the United States. Later on he started his family in Chicago where Sandra was born.
Sandra earned a B.A. in English from Loyola University of Chicago and an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa. She also received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Iowa Writer's Workshop at the University of Iowa in 1978. She attended a workshop and Cisneros discovered how the particular social position she occupied gave her writing a unique potential. She recalls being suddenly struck by the differences between her and her classmates: "It wasn't as if I didn't know who I was. I knew I was a Mexican woman."
Her books of poetry include Loose Woman (Knopf, 1994), My Wicked, Wicked Ways (1987), The Rodrigo Poems (1985), and Bad Boys (1980). She is also the author of Caramelo (2003);Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories(1991), which won the Quality Paperback Book Club New Voices Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, and the Lannan Foundation Literary Award; and of course The House on Mango Street (1984), which won the American Book Award in 1985; and a bilingual children's book, and Many more.
Sandra currently lives in a Mexican-pink painted house with many creatures in San Antoni, Texas.
Old Maids
by Sandra Cisneros
My cousins and I,
we don't marry.
We're too old
by Mexican standards.
And the relatives
have long suspected
we can't anymore
in white.
My cousins and I,
we're all old
maids at thirty.
Who won't dress children,
and never saints--
though we undress them.
The aunts,
they've given up on us.
No longer nudge--You're next.
Instead--
What happened in your childhood?
What left you all mean teens?
Who hurt you, honey?
But we've studied
marriages too long--
Aunt Ariadne,
Tia Vashti,
Comadre Penelope,
querida Malintzin,
Senora Pumpkin Shell--
lessons that served us well.
Las
Girlfriends
by Sandra Cisneros
Tip the barmaid in tight jeans.
She's my friend.
Been to hell and back again.
I've been there too.
Girlfriend, I believe in Gandhi.
But some nights nothing says it
quite precise like a lone Star
cracked on someone's head.
Last week in this same bar,
kicked a cowboy in the butt
who made a grab for Terry's ass.
How do I explain, it was all
of Texas I was kicking,
and all our asses on the line.
At Tacoland, Cat flamencoing crazy
circles round the pool
player with the furry tongue.
A warpath of sorts for every
wrong ever wronged us.
And Terry here has her own history,
A bar down the street she can't
--from the 1994 poetry collection, Loose Woman